"The genius of President Obama is his ability to make smart people work harder." Surely every manager wants to aspire to this ability, but first he must find "smart" staff. The objective of this article is to help readers better prepare to recruit smart people to work for them. An ideal IT staff member should have a computer science background or equivalent education. He or she should possess both technical and people skills. In identifying proper strengths from candidates' application material, we must be mindful of the subtle nuances. Sometimes, what hasn't been said is more important than what has. We need to be mindful that talking to a reference can usually give a more accurate assessment about an applicant than a written recommendation. We also need to be mindful that smart people in general prefer working with a boss who is more collegial than authoritative.